The musings of a wondering minstrel.

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Rainbow Pages #1

Aliya, a 14 year old girl, was all very tensed up and nervous. It usually happens with her during her school exams. Though a good student but this nervousness was a vital part of her and never left her. She hated it. She was worried about the results as she had done bad in her previous year.

“Oh no, what will I do. If I don’t get good marks this time, Mamma’s sure going to kill me.”, thought Aliya. “It’s okay Aliya, it’s just your half-yearly exam and not your final ones. You’ll definitely do great in your finals.”, assured her inner-self.

Now all-packed up, confident and ready, Aliya went off to school cycling through the narrow paths of the beautiful valley she lived in. The rocks bathing in the splashing waters of the spring. The mountains boasting about their highness and divinity with snow-capped peaks. It was a lovely weather and Aliya felt very light-hearted. She felt that today’s going to be the best part of her life. She felt happy and cheerful and there was not a tinge of nervousness left in her mind.

She stopped at the cycle stand of her school, hurriedly locking her cycle and running towards her classroom with the fear of not getting late. Students were swarming in every corridors of the school. Some laughing, some enjoying, some studious ones engrossed and deeply melted into their books and some truants, hardly caring, were fighting with each other. Aliya turned a blind eye towards every one of them and went straight to the corridor where her classroom was, looking for any of her friends. She didn’t have a best friend at that time and she was hardly so friendly with everyone. But, she had a friend who always cared for her and catered to her irrelevant blabbers. And she was looking for that particular girl in the crowd, Rhea. Rhea was nowhere to be found. “May be she hasn’t come yet. It’s hardly any time. I came so early.”, said Aliya to herself. After waiting for 10 minutes, Aliya finally decided to enter the room and wait there by her seat which was already reserved for everyone with their roll numbers. She turned towards the door and stopped there for a moment. There were a lot of students in the classroom but her eyes were locked at one person who was sitting near the window of the classroom. He was laughing with his friend at some stupid joke and for a moment she thought he looked like an angel shining in the bright golden sunlight that was pouring in through the windows. She smiled at him unknowingly. Though the boy didn’t notice her smiling of course but Aliya was lost somewhere. She went blank for a moment but soon regained her senses. There was a war going on in her mind.

“I know this guy, I know him. I somehow know.”

“No, you don’t know him. You haven’t even seen him before.”

“I know I haven’t seen him before but I know him, I know him somehow I don’t know.”

She finally gave up the conversation in her mind and proceeded to look for her seat, to be more precise, her roll number. She saw it in the first row, her roll number wasn’t there. In the second row, it wasn’t there too. In the third row, she moved from seat to seat and finally stopped at one place. There it was! Her roll number was written on the table of her seat but, she stopped dead again for a moment. She just realized she was about to sit with that same person she unknowingly smiled at and whom she unknowingly knows, as if from ages. Now, there were butterflies in her tummy and she started feeling nervous all of a sudden. She felt stupid. She didn’t know what to do. She knew he was her senior because he didn’t belong to her class. And they all had to sit with their seniors during exams, this was the arrangement. But she hardly talked with any senior. She was a timid and a shy girl always confined to her own world. She sat down and stared at the table for a moment. Again some kind of war was going on in her mind. She moved restlessly, her eyes straining to find her friend Rhea in the crowd of all the students. But she was still nowhere to be found. She just hoped that guy wouldn’t start talking with her because she’ll get so nervous and wouldn’t be able to speak a word properly. She didn’t want to make a fun of herself. But, the inevitable finally happened.

“Hey, hi! I am Ali and you?”, asked that guy.

“Han? Oh, hi. I am Aliya.”, replied Aliya with a little difficulty.

“Okay, so any help you need during your exams, I’ll be ready to help you out.” said Ali.

Ali was just about to say something but his friend interrupted and he again got lost in laughing, talking and blabbering with his friend.

Someone said, “Hey!”, and Aliya felt a kind of relief in her heart. It was Rhea, finally. They both talked about their preparations for their exams and Aliya felt a bit uneasy with that guy, Ali around.

“So Aliya, all ready?”, asked Rhea.

“Yeah, kind of you can say.”, Aliya said, feeling every kind of self-consciousness.

“You know what, these exams are a pain in my ass. I never get the hang of them.”

“They are for everyone Rhea, and our situation is like – if you don’ wanna get your ass operated, you gotta study.”

With a painful look, Rhea agreed.

“Hey! Sir’s here. All the best!”

“Same to you!”

They both returned back to their seats when the teacher entered. Aliya slightly looked at Ali from the corner of her eye. He was talking with her classmate Ann, who sat in front of him and offered his ‘all-time’ help to her. He looked happy and cheerful. A big smile was spread on his even face. For some unknown reason, Aliya smiled again but suddenly realizing Ali just looked at her, she acted as if she didn’t know a thing.

“Best of luck, Aliya!”

“Yea. Same…same to…all the best.” Words hardly came out.

It was a two and a half hours exam of English subject and Aliya did well. She was happy for that but at the same time she wondered about Ali. Did he do well? Yeah, must have. Looks like a good student. Both of theirs exam got over and they started to get off. Aliya wanted to say goodbye but restrained herself from doing so. She thought she’ll come early tomorrow again.

On her way back home, she felt light-hearted again. She felt a wonderful feeling she had never felt before. She wandered through the grassy path of the valley looking at the skies and the beautiful birds chirping around. She smiled at the colorful flowers and sang something she hardly knew. A spontaneous song! Now for some reason she was thinking about Ali. She thought about the whole day and how it transpired. She felt good. She stopped at the edge of the spring and looked at her reflection in the water. “I am no angel but I feel like an angel today.” And laughing, she said to herself, “I am a crack-head!”.

After she returned home her Mum enquired about the exam.

“How was the exam dear?”

Grinning Aliya replied, “Not a pain in my butt but a flower in my heart!”, and flopped away to her room.

Her Mom stood there for a moment wondering what happened to her daughter but since her beloved daughter was blissful and happy, she heaved a sigh of relief and went back to complete her daily household course.

Meanwhile, resting on her bed Aliya started wondering, though nothing great happened today still she felt happy as if it was the best day of her life. And hardly caring, she went off to sleep.

(To be continued)

P.S. – Well, the complete story is going to be based on the experiences I and my friends had during our lives coupled with a little bit of imagination. I am just confused with the title. What should I use – Rainbow Pages/Yellow Pages/Pages of Life/Phases. Your suggestions please. The majority will be accepted.

Nice starting..shall wait for the conclusive part…seems “Pages of life” is more suitable,then you have more options to conclude..rainbow pages will indicate the story has a definitely sweet colourful ending.

If I saw the title “Pages of Life” on a book, I’d suspect it was something ostentatiously arty and “clever”. It sounds to me like something written by a self-defined artist for self-defined artists. There’s nothing in that title that draws me in or creates interest, except that the subversive in me might say. “OK, and will the sequel be Pages of Death?”.

Rainbow of course has positive connotations, but you can’t have a rainbow without rain. Maybe Rainbow could be combined with something less pleasant-sounding but fitting well with rainbows in the real world? Rainbow and Storm?

I am going to make it a taut story according to the name. :) But it isn’t going to contain all rainbow days. I used the word for a reason – just like rainbow has different colors, so does our life. This was the reason behind it. I hope I do write it pretty well. :)